Pressure

What is the difference between Social Pressure and Peer Pressure?

The biggest difference is what a person feels pressure from (of).

Social pressure seems to be based on general social morality while peer pressure is based on inner rules of his/her close friends.

For example, when a person feels pressure and couldn't refuse to take the dope, it is what you call “peer pressure”. In another case, when student athletes face pressure to win, from peers, parents and coaches, it can be peer pressure, too.

In the move “Finding Forrester” we saw in Yukari’s class, a guy named Jamal was hiding the fact he was reading many books and writing notes about the books in order to avoid to stand out. He was talking about basketball (they call it “the ball”) all the time with his friends or his mother because he wanted to be a part of his friends. His behavior has a lot to do with peer pressure.

Also, Jamal and other boys are wearing same kinds of outfits, hair styles. Without noticing or not, friends are getting similar because of peer pressure.



On the other hand, social pressure is more general.
One example I can think of feeling social pressure is that a thirty something single woman always being asked when or whom she is getting married.
Moreover, after one woman gets married, she is under pressure to be asked “Are you having a lovely baby yet?” hundreds of times. That’s social pressure, too.